Kim Possible: The Last: Kim Possible Returns
by Jezrianna2.0
Summary: After an absence of more than a year, Kim Possible returns to Earth. Contains spoliers. Ongoing.
1. Chapter 1

_Kim Possible is the property of Disney_

_Superman is the property of Warner Bros._

_Contains spoilers for the movie Superman Returns and my crossover with Classic Cowboy, The Worlds Finest._

**Kim Possible: The Last**

**Kim Possible Returns**

**Prologue**

"It's only a year, Ron", Kim Possible, world famous red headed superhero, murmured as she felt her husband's arms tighten around her.

"Only a year," Ron Stoppable, blond master of mystical monkey power and Kim's unashamed sidekick in Team Possible, repeated painfully.

Ron, just recently married to his best friend since pre-K, couldn't keep the anguish out of his voice.

"In twenty-five years, we've never been apart, Kim," he said softly. "Remind me why I can't go with you."

Kim's eyes were leaking tears. She'd known it would be hard, but she hadn't thought it would be this hard. And Ron wasn't even objecting to her leaving. Ever since NASA had published those pictures of Krypton, still intact, with illuminated cities plainly visible on it's night side, she'd been torn by doubt. What if Jor-el had been wrong? All the information stored aboard the ship that had brought her to Earth had been recorded before she left the world of her birth. The imagery of Krypton's destruction, she'd discovered, was only a simulation of what her biological father had thought was going to happen. If there was any chance, no matter how slim, that she wasn't the last of her people, she had to know. And there was only one way to find out.

"Krypton is halfway across the galaxy, Ron," she choked, "And the ship can travel a lot faster, if it's only me."

"Kimmie's right, Ron."

Ron turned his head to look at the source of the words.

James Possible, Kim's adoptive father. Now in his sixties, hair shot through with gray, he was the director of the Middleton Science Center, the most famous laboratory on Earth.

"She can tolerate much higher G loads than you or any other human possibly could, Ron. That will let us dial down the inertial compensator, and shave years off the trip."

"I know," Ron acknowledged, his own voice breaking. Understanding the reality of the situation didn't make the matter any easier to bear.

"I'll be back, Ron," Kim said, fiercely. "I swear I will, no matter what I find."

"I love you, Kim," Ron replied, kissing his wife on her forehead, then on her lips. "Now get out of here," he commanded, sniffling.

Smiling, weeping, Kim turned and climbed up into the ship that her biological father had built, that her adoptive father had modified. The access hatch closed behind her. Moments later the ship was rising, climbing toward the heavens, disappearing from view.

* * *

**Chapter One**

A year and more passed.

Life went on.

People forgot.

There were other heroes, after all.

Ron Stoppable.

In Gotham City Bruce Wayne, one of Team Possible's benefactors, inspired by an encounter with a dimensional alternate of Ron's, had assumed the role of Batman.

Kansas City had The Flash, a man who could run as fast as the speed of sound.

New York had Wonder Woman, representative of the Amazons to the world of man.

Germany had the Blue Beetle.

Japan had Booster Gold.

They were all great heroes.

But they all had four flaws.

None of them was faster than a speeding bullet.

None of them was more powerful than a locomotive.

None of them was able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.

None of them was Superwoman.

Life went on.

Kim became a memory. Almost a legend.

* * *

It was Independence Day, and Ron was in the Team Possible jet, over the Pacific Ocean, flying chase on _Genesis_, the new space shuttle, as it prepared for it's maiden flight. Piggybacked onto an Air Force 777, _Genesis_ would ascend not quite into orbit. Once it detached from its carrier, solid rocket boosters would propel the craft into the mesosphere. There, the main engines would ignite, launching _Genesis_ into a sub-orbital flight that would carry it across the United States and all the way to Rota, in Spain, where it would land. 

Aboard the 777, a NASA administrator was giving a talk to that effect, complete with CGI animations of what the flight would look like, for the benefit of two dozen reporters from various newspapers and television networks. Ron couldn't hear what was being said, but he was sure that one of those reporters, one Bonnie Rockwaller of CNN, was making the administrator's life a living hell with annoying questions.

Houston Control's voice crackled in Ron's ears. "_Genesis_, we are go for launch. Automatic ignition program engaged, t-minus sixty seconds."

Ron heard the shuttle commander acknowledge the fact. Aboard the 777 the NASA administrator took a seat and strapped herself in. She kept on talking, though.

"_Genesis_ will automatically separate from the carrier at t-minus twenty seconds. We'll immediately enter a diving turn to get clear of the blast from the solid rocket boosters. However, if we're lucky, we just may hear the faint pop of the sonic boom as _Genesis_ breaks the sound barrier."

It happened at t-minus thirty-two seconds.

It started in Phoenix, Arizona, and spread around the world at the speed of light.

Power grids failed.

Cell phones died.

TV's went dark.

Off the coast of California, Ron watched as every system in the Team Possible jet went dead, including the engines. He tried various procedures without result. He didn't panic: his flight controls were triple redundant, with direct physical links to the jet's control surfaces, so he could at least glide to a landing. He was already slowing down though, and losing altitude. A quick glance showed that the two Air Force F-22 _Raptor_ fighters helping him with the chase mission were in the same boat, as was the 777. Then, just as suddenly as a they had gone down, everything came back up. In moments Ron had his engines restarted.

"What the hell was that?" one of the other chase pilots asked.

The shuttle commander said, "Houston, we had a power glitch up here, but we are up and running again."

"Roger that, _Genesis_," Houston replied. "We had a power glitch here as well. It seems to have been a world wide event."

"What caused it?"

"We don't know, and until we find out, we'd better play it safe and abort the mission."

"Roger Houston, aborting the mission."

On _Genesis'_ flight deck, the co-pilot reached out to press the appropriate button to terminate the launch sequence. Then she pressed it again. And again.

"Houston, the program won't shut down. We are still counting down to ignition."

"Copy that, _Genesis_, we can't shut it down from the ground either. Looks like we're gonna have to go through with it no matter what."

The shuttle commander steeled himself. Hopefully, the program was the only glitch the electrical problem had caused. If not, it might be a very short flight.

"Coming up on automatic disengagement," the shuttle co-pilot intoned, "In three, two, one, mark."

They were expecting a sharp jolt.

They got a half hearted thunk, followed by a blaze of warning lights.

"Houston, we have a disengagement failure. Attempting manual release."

Another weak thunk.

On board the carrier the co-pilot, beginning to feel a little frantic, tried uncoupling the shuttle from that end, with similar results, as the remaining seconds ticked relentlessly away. The pilot of the 777 hit his intercom button and said, "We're still attached to the shuttle, and its engines are about to ignite. If you aren't already, strap yourselves in. And pray."

In the cabin behind him, Bonnie Rockwaller sucked in a sharp breath. She knew from reading the material in the press kit she'd been given that the three struts that held the shuttle on top of the jet were immensely strong, far stronger than they needed to be for what they were expected to do, as was the additional bracing within the jet itself. If they could climb high enough, into thin enough air, the struts _might_ hold during the SRB burn. But when the main engines lit, they were sure to fail. And if they didn't _all_ fail, at the exact same instant, unequal stress would tear the jet and the shuttle to bits. The odds against that happening were beyond astronomical.

So, she reasoned, they were all about to die.

"...three, two, one, ignition."

Smoke and flame exploded from the SRB's. In seconds the 777's vertical stabilizer was gone, melted by the fierce heat. NASA had added two more, at the tips of the horizontal stabilizers, but they were already smoldering, and probably wouldn't last long.

"She's pulling away," the lead chase pilot called, even as he, his wingman, and Ron advanced their throttles to keep up.

The programmed delay between SRB ignition and the main engines was sixty seconds, and Ron never knew a minute could go by so fast. The jet was climbing, and now even he could no longer follow it. Houston and the astronauts were working furiously to solve the problem, but nothing was working.

Suddenly, an air traffic controller broke in with, "An unidentified aircraft just entered your area."

Ron looked at his radar. Sure enough there was a pip at the edge of the display. Still, it was a hundred miles astern, and probably not an issue. "I see it," he said, and...

...his radar had a one second sweep cycle. On the next update, the pip was only ninety miles away. On the next one it was less than eighty. Math had never been Ron's strong suit, but it didn't take him long to realize, "My God, it's going six thousand miles an hour... and it's accelerating!"

Seconds later Houston warned that the main engines were about to ignite. Ron turned to see a huge plume of fire erupt from the shuttle. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a blue and red blur hurtle past him. Suddenly, he had trouble breathing.

Aboard the shuttle the crew were still trying to cut loose. They all knew space flight was risky, and accepted that fact, but they were understandably not keen on dying if they could help it.

A green light flashed to life on the control panel, and the crew gaped at it. It was one of the coupling lights, and indicated that one of them had just come undone, which was impossible since they were still alive. Then a second one lit, then the third, and then acceleration was slamming them back in their seats as the shuttle went rocketing toward space.

Aboard the jet it was still and quiet. Bonnie felt light, almost as if she was on that free fall ride in Las Vegas. This wasn't any fun though. In the cockpit the crew assessed their situation. The engines were dead, burned up from overspeeding. The rudder and elevators were non-functional, more than likely because they had been destroyed. The controls in the wings still worked, but with only them, landing was going to be extremely difficult. As they fell toward the Earth, the jet began to yaw, a sure sign the vertical stabilizers were gone. The pilot opened the speed brakes on the left wing a little to null it out. He tried to anyway, but the speed brake opened all the way, and wouldn't close, and the jet began to enter a flat spin, slowly at first, but with ever increasing speed. He tried the speed brake on the right wing, but it only opened a little before it too became unresponsive.

They were spinning ever faster, even as they plummeted Earthward, and the pilot knew it wouldn't be long before centrifugal force ripped the plane apart.

There was a violent lurch, and the spin slowed suddenly.

"We must have lost something," the pilot said. "Check the wing on your side," he told the co-pilot, even as he turned his own head to check the left wing.

The co-pilot craned his neck against the force of the spin. He caught a glimpse of the ring wing, and for a moment he thought he saw...something...at the very tip.

Then the wing broke off, and the spin came back with full fury.

They were plunging straight down now, the remaining wing spinning the fuselage around like a falling maple seed. When it broke off as well, the spin began to slow, and the pilot could see the were over the coast, above the San Francisco Bay area, the city of Oakland to be exact.

The pilot heaved a sigh. With the wings gone there was nothing left they could do. It was all over. Without taking his eyes off the cityscape rushing up at him he said, with remarkable calm, "At least it'll be quick."

The co-pilot responded with a laconic, "Yeah."

Then they found themselves hanging from the harnesses that kept them in their seats. In the cabin behind them, anything that wasn't nailed down went flying to the front bulkhead, while passengers pitched forward in their seats. Bonnie blinked in amazement. A steady, relentless force was pulling her against the belt across her lap.

* * *

A capacity crowded filled McAfee Coliseum in Oakland, watching their beloved A's take on their neighbors from across the bay, the San Francisco Giants. It was the top of the fourth, tied two-all, and Alberto Chavez, the A's star hitter this season, had just stepped up to bat. After a few practice swings he settled into his stance. The Giant's pitcher wound up and let fly. Alberto swung, connected, and spat a curse, for he knew, just by the feel of the bat, that he'd hit a high pop fly. Like everyone else in the stadium he craned his neck to follow the ball, then promptly forgot all about baseball as his eyes took in the wingless airliner headed straight for him. 

Shock paralyzed everyone, keeping them from moving. Then shock turned to awe. In utter silence, the crowd watched the jet shudder to a halt just above the ground, halfway between home plate and the pitchers mound. Then silence continued as the remains of the plane tilted downward, to settle gently on the grassy expanse of the field. It was only when a lithe figure in red and blue detached itself from the crumpled nose of the craft and flew over to the crew access door that fifty thousand human voices erupted in a titanic cheer.

Within the jet, Bonnie and the others were trying, in a somewhat dazed manner, to figure out what had happened. They had some how fallen from the edge of space, a very, very violent and rapid fall, only end up sitting, level and alive, in what seemed to be a baseball stadium full of cheering people.

A new shudder ran through the plane and Bonnie felt a twinge of renewed panic, but it was only the hatchway opening...

Then _she_ stepped into the cabin and everyone's breath caught in their throats.

"Is everyone alright?" the newcomer asked in the voice Bonnie knew so well from their old days of high school rivalry. Silent, dumbfounded nods answered her.

The newcomer smiled in relief, gave Bonnie a nod of acknowledgement, and said, "Well, I certainly hope this little incident hasn't put any of you off flying. Statistically speaking of course, it's still the safest way to travel."

When she turned to go Bonnie and her fellow reporters finally shook out of their stupor and began peppering her with questions, but she dismissed them with a smile and wave, and stepped back into the open hatchway.

The cheers of the crowd, which hadn't subsided, rose even higher. She felt her cheeks heat, the more so when she caught sight of her image on the stadium's Jumbotron display. Finally, afraid she'd break into tears if she lingered, she gathered herself and sprang upward, disappearing into the blue California sky.

She would have been considerably more embarrassed to know that the scene in the stadium was being played out all over the world.

In private homes, in bars, in offices, anywhere there were TV's, people where cheering, laughing, even weeping with joy.

She was back.

Kim Possible was back.

Superwoman had returned.


	2. Chapter 2

_Thanks to Triaxx2 and Darkcloud1 for planting the seeds of this chapter way back in their reviews of chapter one of 'The Last'._

**Chapter Two**

It was just under a thousand miles from Oakland, California to Middleton, Colorado, and Kim covered the distance in less than twenty minutes.

'I've gotten faster,' she mused to herself. That was rather obvious given how she'd overtaken the _Genesis_, which had barely begun building when she'd left. But the massive speed she'd used to close the distance between her and it must have been the result of adrenalin or something, for she felt quite drained at the moment. Still, even tired she was managing a higher speed than she'd been capable of before she left.

As the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains passed beneath her, Kim's green eyes focused on the city of Middleton. All the old familiar landmarks were plain to see: Middleton High, the Tri-City Convention Center, the Science Center...

..and her home.

The Possible household, much remodeled and enlarged over the years, still stood where it always had. Mole Rat Hill rose behind it. X-ray vision revealed that Rufus's kin had been busy in her absence, as their network of tunnels and burrows was more extensive than ever. The concrete monolith that was Team Possible Headquarters looked the same at first glance, but her eyes soon picked out minor alterations, mostly among the antenna's that festooned the roof.

There was a vast swathe of green between the three edifices, the yard where she and her brothers (and Ron, she reminded herself with a smile) had played for hours as children, and where now her nieces and nephews did the same, along with their mole-rat playmates.

A knot of people had gathered in the yard. Her parents, her brothers and their wives and children. Mr. and Mrs. Stoppable were there, too, she saw.

A less welcome sight were the crowds of reporters encircling the complex, held at bay by fences and security personnel.

'So many already,' Kim thought with a shake of her head. She grinned wryly. 'And only the first hint of what's to come, no doubt.'

Kim wasted no time. The members of her family had been craning their necks, trying to catch a glimpse of her. When one spotted her the others all turned to watch, in silence, as she swooped down to land in front of them.

They stared.

She stared.

Her parents had aged noticeably, or at least, so it seemed. Her brother Jim and his wife Alicia were holding back their two children, James III and little Kimberly, both of whom had grown significantly.

Her brother Tim, newly married shortly before Kim left, was standing with his wife Karen, who was holding a newborn baby.

Ron's parents looked older as well, as did the naked mole-rat perched on his shoulder.

Her father, his eyes glistening, found his voice first. "Kimmie."

That was the breaking point for Kim. She stepped forward, gathering her mother and father into her arms as they did the same to her, bursting into tears as they embraced her. Before she knew it, Kim was at the center of a mass of weeping humanity who, it seemed, were trying to drown her in tears of their own, while simultaneously smothering her with love.

It was a terrific feeling.

Better feelings were coming, though.

Kim heard it at the same time the others did: she might have super hearing, far more sensitive and discriminatory than a normal person's, but even she couldn't hear sounds before they reached her.

There was a blast like thunder, as if a giant had clapped his hands above their heads, then the air was filled with the screaming roar of high performance jet engines. The Team Possible jet hurtled overhead, slowly rapidly as it swung around in a wide loop before heading toward Team Possible HQ. Children and naked-mole rats (many of whom were watching the proceedings from Mole Rat Hill) covered their ears against the noise. Few of the adults did, for whatever reason.

Kim smiled. However excited Ron must have felt, he flew with steady precision, not rushing anything. Shifting the jet into VTOL mode he set it down on the roof of TPHQ as lightly as a feather drifting down onto a swatch of silk.

Kim waited breathlessly, her heart pounding in her chest. Refusing to peek, she just listened.

Listened as the engines cut out, as systems ran down, as the plane relaxed and cooled in a series of pings and creaks. Then she heard the whine of a servomotor. That was the canopy opening. The rustle of cloth, the sound of shoes on metal, then concrete, and then...

...there he was, at the edge of the roof, staring down at them.

Staring down at her.

Then he took a single step backward, lunged forward, and leapt.

He hit the ground right in front of her, and Kim felt the pulse of mystical energy that slowed his fall at the last moment. He straightened, and she found herself gazing up at him, into those gorgeous brown eyes of his, the one's she hadn't seen in so, so long.

He reached out, slowly, his fingertips brushing her cheek, making their way into her crimson tresses.

He was trembling. She was, too.

"Ron, I..."

She didn't get to finish, her words cut short by his lips pressing against hers in a fiercely passionate kiss. The embrace she found herself caught in was equally fierce, and she returned it with all her might. With anyone else Kim always had to remind herself to careful, lest she crush them, but not with Ron. Whether it was some subconscious safety switch, or (as seemed much more likely) the mystical monkey power somehow protecting him, in intimate moments he was totally immune to her super strength.

Slowly the embrace, along with the kisses, drifted down from fierce to gentle. When they finally paused to catch their breath, Ron touched his forehead to Kim's and looked into her eyes.

"One year, four months and seventeen days," he chided. "You're late, Kim."

Kim blushed rosily. "I know," she apologized. "The trip back took longer than we expected."

"Well, I forgive you," Ron smiled softly, kissing her again.

After giving Kim and Ron a little time to themselves, Kim's mother spoke up.

"Did you find what you were looking for, Kim?" she asked.

Kim broke off kissing Ron at Patricia's words. Half turning in her husband's arms Kim looked at her mother and said, "Yes and no. Has the ship landed yet? When we popped out of hyperspace in low orbit the first thing I picked up was the Team Possible general alarm about the shuttle, so I set the ship on automatic and dove out the airlock."

"It's coming in now, Kimmie," her father said. "It should be down in a few minutes." Shading his eyes with his hand James scanned the sky, then pointed. "There it is now, in fact," he declared.

The black, arrowhead shaped ship swept in from the southwest, almost silent on its counter-grav drive. As it did so a portion of the lawn lifted up and slid aside to make way for a rising elevator platform, the same one that had lifted the ship from the secret room James had stored it in for so long. The platform locked into place, and the ship settled down onto it.

"When I arrived in the Rao system," Kim began, "I found Krypton almost right away. What was left of it, at least. The mass of the planet was still there, but spread out in a debris field millions of miles across." Kim paused, wondering how she could convey the feelings of horror she'd experienced as she'd watched mountains of glowing green rock tumble through space, their sickly emanations somehow mocking her loss. What words she could use to convey the growing sense of futility as she did a painstaking search of every arcsecond of the sky, listening for some sign of life, anywhere in the system.

"Eventually I did find a handful of signals," Kim related. "Three were from solar powered relay satellites that had somehow survived the explosion well enough to still be putting out weak carrier waves, since there was nothing left for them to relay. Another was from a small ship that was intact but abandoned, and its signal was just a constant update of its position." Kim smiled grimly at the image of the ship, faithfully reporting its whereabouts to an owner who had been dead for years.

"The one other signal I found came from the edge of the system, and lead me to an astronomical observatory," Kim said. She paused and turned toward the ship. She touched a control on her belt and the access hatch opened.

Kim called out...

...in Kryptonian.

A figure appeared in the hatchway, a boy, or rather a young man of about fourteen, solidly built (if a bit on the skinny side), wearing a silvery jumpsuit, with shaggy black hair. His bright blue eyes blinked in the unfamiliar yellow sunlight, and he seemed nervous as he stared at the crowd of people looking up at him.

"This is Kal-el," Kim said solemnly, "Son of Son-el and Ven-de, last survivor of the Argo Five Deep Space Observatory, and the last son Krypton."

* * *

The boy Kal-el sat at the table in the Possible's kitchen, cautiously tasting various foods that Kim's mother set in front of him. His jumpsuit was gone, replaced by a pair of old sweat pants and a tee-shirt, and his hair was neatly brushed. 

("It's all safe for you to eat, Kal-el,") Kim reminded him as she watched, ("You just have to figure out what you like best.")

The rest of Kim's family were hovering in around the kitchen door, despite repeated shooings by Patricia. Finally, driven to the edge of her patience she gave them "the look", and they scattered.

That issue resolved (at least for the moment) Patricia returned her attention to the boy seated at her kitchen table. Kal-el, who had seemed apprehensive both of her and of the food she'd placed before him, had just sampled the small bowl of fruit salad she'd set out. In the blink of an eye his apprehension vanished and, spoon flying, he proceeded to shovel the contents of the bowl into his mouth.

Kim, who had changed to civvies herself (a halter top and pajama pants) and who was relaxing in Ron's arms at the other end of the table, giggled in spite of herself. Kal-el blushed, but kept right on eating, though he did moderate his pace a bit.

James stepped into the kitchen from the direction of the garage, took in the scene, and said quietly to Kim, "How's he coping?"

"About as well as can be expected," Kim answered. "When I found him, he'd spent most of the last four decades in a temporal inhibitor field. As far as he was concerned, Krypton had exploded barely six months earlier."

Kim's face tightened. On the voyage back Kal-el had related to her the tale of horror and desperation that was the story of the Argo Five station and its crew. Not only had they witnessed the sudden, cataclysmic demise of their homeworld, but they had been quick to realize that they, a bare two dozen people, were the only survivors. Everyone else had either been killed outright, or had succumbed to the weird, deadly radiation emanating from the remains of their planet. Only the fact that Argo Five was located billions of radd'as from Krypton had kept them from perishing as well.

At least in the short term. Argo Five had been designed for long duration missions, and only needed to be re-supplied once a year or so. They had been just so topped off only a couple of months previously, which meant they had most of a year in which to try and find a solution to their predicament.

Alas, one was not forthcoming. They had several ships, but they were all in-system craft. They had repair facilities, but lacked both the means and the materials to build a hyperdrive. Driven to despair, some of the staff had committed suicide. It was part of the horror of those days that the sorrow their friends and colleagues felt was tainted with relief that now there was more food, water and air for the rest of them.

Finally they had hit upon a course of action that would greatly increase their chances of survival. The station's sick bay had a number of emergency stasis chambers. The chambers were meant to be used in the event of an injury or illness beyond the capabilities of the station's medical staff to handle. The patient would be placed inside, where time would slow to a crawl at the hands of Kryptonian science. While a few minutes passed (from the patient's point of view) a rescue ship could make the two day journey from Krypton and back, and transport the patient to a hospital back home.

The Argo survivors planned to use the chambers for a similar purpose. Inside, they would enter a state of induced sleep. Computers would pump nutrients and water into them intravenously. Outside, several years would pass for every subjective day. It was hoped that in those years someone would hear the distress signal they were sending, and come and rescue them.

Well, it did work, sort of, Kim admitted.

Unfortunately, by the time she'd arrived, all the capsules had failed, save one. Within it she'd found a half-starved, slightly dehydrated boy. On learning that his parents were dead he'd been overcome by grief, naturally. Once he'd eaten some proper food and slaked his terrible thirst, Kim had helped him bury the station crew, wrapping their bodies in plastic and launching them toward the fiery red supergiant Rao. Only then had Kal-el been willing to board Kim's ship for the journey to Earth.

In the three subjective months the return trip had taken, Kim had started to teach the boy English, and told him about her friends and family. Kal-el had been fascinated, though he was still subject to bouts of grief, and spent too many hours (in Kim's opinion) viewing images of Krypton in the ship's computers.

"How did he react when you dove out the airlock without a suit once you got back to Earth?" Ron asked quietly.

Kim smiled gently. "I haven't told him much about how yellow sunlight affects us," she revealed, the rare reference to herself as a Kryptonian instead of a Human catching Ron's notice. "I'm sure he thought I was either mad, or that my mission togs were some kind of spacesuit."

"Kimmie, I've been wondering," Patricia interjected. "Are you and Kal-el related somehow?"

Hearing his name, Kal-el looked up from his eating. Kim translated her mother's question, and he nodded, grinning.

"We are," Kim confirmed, "but only distantly. We're both descended from Sor-el," she explained, referring to one of the three Founders, along with Kol-ar and Pol-us, of 'modern' Krypton. "We're sixth cousins, once removed, if I remember my genealogy right."

"Well," Patricia said, "I had Alicia make up the guest room. Later on we'll go to the mall and get Kal some clothes." Kim could tell from her mother's expression and tone of voice that Kal-el had just become part of Kim's extended family.

"Let's do that tomorrow, Mom," Kim demurred. "After supper, Ron and I were hoping to do some..." she paused and cleared her throat, "...catching up."

James gave his daughter an amused look. "Is that what they're calling it these days?"

Kim blushed, as did Ron, who came to Kim's defense. "Why yes, as a matter of fact it is."

* * *

In an industrial park in Phoenix, Arizona, in a non-descript metal building that bore a sign proclaiming 'Atlantis Technologies - Building a Better Future Today', Heinrich Demenz, known to the world at large as Professor Dementor, reflected on the days events. Beyond the walls of the cubicle that served as his office, in the center of building, reared a tower of concrete, plastic and wood, all interlaced with, and supported by, gleaming glass-like crystals. 

He had half expected just such a thing to occur, based on his studies of the ancient texts he'd discovered, but the results had still stunned him. The tiny shard of crystal he'd used, dropped into a tank of water, had proceeded to assimilate both the water, and the tank, and parts of the floor, and anything else within reach, to build the monolith that now stood in the center of his lab. The blackout the experiment had caused had been an unforeseen side effect, but it didn't bother Dementor. That Kim Possible had finally returned from her trip to Krypton did, but not so much. For the first time ever since he'd encountered the red-headed hero, Dementor felt he had a solid advantage.

Few people believed that Atlantis, the fabled land described by Plato, had ever really existed. Of those that did, the majority were crackpots, while the rest held that the Atlantis story was based on that of Minoan Crete, laid waste by the eruption of Thera in 1500 B.C.

Heinrich Demenz knew better, though. Years of painstaking research, and some inspired guesswork, had led him to the underwater ruins of a truly majestic civilization. The artifacts he'd found there proved the truth of Arthur C. Clarke's maxim, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." The crystals certainly fell into that category. Self-replicating, they could grow anything: weapons, houses, even food. All they needed were raw materials, and water.

Dementor held one of his crystals up to the light, watching as the crystal diffracted the glow of the bulb into all the colors of the rainbow.

"Possibilities," he muttered, gazing into the depths of the crystal, "Endless...possibilities."


	3. Chapter 3

**Middleton**

Kim awoke to sunlight filtering into her room. It was warm and comfortable in the bed she and Ron shared. Far more comfortable than the sterile confines of a starship's sleeping chamber, to be sure. She felt a slight movement beside her, and turned her head to gaze at her companion.

Ron was still asleep, but only just barely. Even as Kim watched he rolled onto his side, face toward her, and opened his eyes.

"Good morning," he said with a smile, his eyes twinkling.

"It is a _good_ morning," Kim agreed, brushing Ron's lips with a gentle kiss. "But the night was _better_," she confided impishly.

"I take it then that you found my..._ahem_...performance adequate?" Ron asked suggestively, sliding an arm under Kim and drawing her closer.

Kim sighed as she snuggled against him. "I, Mr. Stoppable, am a very satisfied customer," she assured him.

Ron chuckled but said nothing, just stroked Kim's silky red hair, then let his fingertips wander along her shoulder and down her side. Kim's eyes went half-lidded, and she looked up at him from beneath her lashes, green eyes glowing with desire. Ron leaned in to kiss her, and Kim heard his blood quicken in his veins, even as his breathing became ragged.

At that moment there came a sharp rap on their bedroom door.

"Kimmie, Ronald," came the sound of her father's voice. "It's ten o'clock in the morning. Time to get up."

Grudgingly Kim and Ron broke contact and turned away from each other, swinging their legs over their respective edges of the bed.

"I _was_ getting up," Ron grumbled under his breath.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the kitchen Kim and Ron found her brother Jim sitting across the table from Kal-el. Between them was the discus shaped Diary, as it was known in the Possible household. Actually, the Diary was a compact information storage and retrieval device with a holographic display and a keyboard that circled its perimeter. It was active at the moment, the display showing a stream of vertically scrolling Kryptonian glyphs.

As the symbols passed, Jim read them aloud.

("So by the end of the first age of peace, the descendants of Sor-el the Wise were numerous among the great Houses of Krypton, and distinguished themselves most of all in matters scientific, being ceaseless searchers after knowledge,") he said, in passable if heavily accented Kryptonian.

Kal-el ran the text back and started it again, this time reading it himself.

("What are you two doing?") Kim asked as Ron edged past her, making a bee-line for the refrigerator.

"Oh, hi, Sis," Jim greeted her. "Kal and I were just passing the time of day, you know," he continued, a sly grin on his lips. "After all, some of us have been up for three hours already."

"Put a sock in it, Tweeb," Kim commanded, grinning despite herself, tousling Jim's hair as she walked by him.

("Have you already had breakfast, Kal?") Kim asked, addressing the dark haired boy directly.

Kal-el nodded. ("Yes, Kim,") he confirmed. ("Did you and your husband succeed in 'catching up'?") Kal continued politely.

Kim blushed, as did Ron. Jim, in the middle of a swallow of soda, shot liquid out through his nose, then engaged in a fit of coughing laughter.

("If the blush is any sign, I'd say the answer to your question is 'yes', Kal-el,") Jim snickered.

Kal-el was a bright boy, as well as a teenager. Like any Earth-born teen, he was at that age when people started to notice sexual innuendo. He hadn't been sure of the meaning of the phrase 'catching up' beyond the fact that it seemed to be a secret joke of some sort. Now he made the connection, and blushed just as brightly as Kim was.

("Oh,") he stammered, causing Jim to laugh even louder.

Kim fixed her brother with an icy glare. "Could you act _more_ juvenile?" she snapped.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Later, Kim went outside to speak to the press, an undertaking she was sure would last a couple of hours at least. While she did that, Ron took Kal-el and slipped out of the Team Possible compound for a trip to the Middleton Mall to buy him some clothes. Not surprisingly, Kal-el spent most of his time swiveling his head, looking at everything and everybody, so much so that Ron had to say, ("It's not polite to stare at people, Kal-el.")

("I'm sorry,") the boy apologized. ("I was on Argo for two years. It's been a long time since I was in any kind of crowd,") he explained. ("And everything, I mean the lighting, the clothes, everything, is so different from what I'm used to...")

Kal-el's voice trailed off in a way that drew Ron's attention. They were on the second level of the mall, heading for a shoe store. Kal-el, though, was focused on the clothing store they were passing. It was one of those trendy, youth oriented places that existed to separate fashion conscious teens from their money as efficiently as possible. The mannequins in the store's windows were all adorned in currently trendy outfits, except for one. It was wearing simple blue jeans, a tee-shirt, and a ball cap. Kal-el was staring right at it, and Ron knew why. The shirt and cap both sported the diamond enclosed S that was the symbol of the House of El.

Kal-el looked back at Ron, a confused expression on his face, but Ron knew there was more to it than that. Long experience let him read Kal-el's emotions as easily as he could anyone else's, alien thought processes or not. Kal-el's bafflement was underlain with shock and, to Ron's surprise, anger. In a flash of insight Ron realized that on Krypton it simply wasn't done to wear or display the crest of a family you weren't part of.

("We do things a little differently here, Kal-el,") Ron said, calmly but firmly. ("Kim licenses the use of the crest, and uses the money to help fund our work, as well as various charities.")

("Ok, I understand she lets them,") Kal-el nodded, his anger cooling but his confusion growing, ("But why would anyone want to?")

Ron smiled. ("People admire Kim, Kal-el. They look up to her, and want to like her. Wearing the crest makes feel that they _are_ a bit more like her.")

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When Ron returned with his young charge, Kim drew him aside. After exchanging kisses, Kim said, "Ron, I'm going out for a couple of hours. Look after Kal, would you."

"Showing the flag, eh?" Ron guessed.

Kim smiled at him. "You nailed it."

Ron returned a sly grin. "There's something else I'd rather nail," he insinuated, drawing Kim closer.

Kim giggled even as her cheeks went red. "Didn't you get enough last night?" she asked as she pressed up against him.

"Nope," Ron replied, his lips seeking hers again.

"Neither did I," Kim murmured, just before her lips found his.

**Gotham City**

Alfred Pennyworth was examining the apples on display at Truong's Corner Market. It was a fine late summer day, a Wednesday to be exact, and shopping day for the Wayne household. Alfred had served the Wayne family for over forty years, starting under Master Adam, a kind but sickly old gentleman who was all too soon succeeded by his son Thomas as the Master of Wayne Manor.

Master Thomas had proved to be just as kindly, but he had the vigorous energy of youth and health as well. He was also, to Alfred's way of looking at thing, quite progressive. Back home in England, few of the wealthy classes took more than a passing interest in the economic standing of their social inferiors. Perhaps the difference was that Thomas was an American. Whatever the cause, Master Thomas Wayne devoted himself as much to charitable causes as he did to his medical practice.

One of those charitable causes was a decree that the Wayne household would purchase locally as much of whatever it might need in way of supplies. That went for food as well, and Alfred had begun spending his Wednesday afternoons perusing the wares of the Mom and Pop stores and shops of Gotham's various neighborhood markets. The practice had continued after Master Thomas's untimely death, and been endorsed anew when Thomas's son Bruce had returned from his long journey of self-discovery.

Alfred looked around and smiled. This particular market, in the north part of Overbrook, was one of his favorites. It was convenient to Wayne Manor and had, between its dozens of stores and specialty shops, as wide a selection of foodstuffs as you could find in any superstore. It was prosperous, too. For a long time markets like this had struggled to make ends meet, due in no small part to the crime and corruption that had been strangling Gotham. The fall of Carmine Falconé and the subsequent disruption of his crime syndicate had done much to relieve the burden on the poorer folk of Gotham. And what Falconé's collapse had begun, the ongoing actions of a certain Caped Crusader had continued. Corrupt policemen were being weeded out of the force, and many who remained were keeping their heads down, afraid they'd be next. Street crime was down somewhat as well, likely because the current level of prosperity meant that fewer people felt compelled to steal to support themselves.

Whatever the reason, Gotham had just seemed like a nicer, happier place of late. All around Alfred was a crowd of busy, talkative people, going about their business, but with smiles on their faces, rather than the pervasive expressions of gloom he had seen for so long.

And to be honest, today was exceptionally pleasant, with bright, clear sky's a perfect sunshine.

Alfred returned his attention to the apples he'd been looking at. Master Bruce had expressed a desire for apple pie for dessert one night this week and Alfred was dutifully about procuring the needed ingredients. Out of the corner of his eye Alfred noticed the owner, Lahn 'John' Truong approaching him. 'Johnny', as he preferred to be known, had come to Gotham in the late sixties, just as Alfred had, but for a different reason. Johnny was escaping the turmoil that was engulfing his home land of Viet Nam, along with his wife and two young children. The two men had met not long after Johnny opened his shop, and over the years had become friends.

"Alfred!" Johnny hailed him. "Good to see you!" The slightly built, somewhat wizened Vietnamese man eyed what Alfred had been looking at and chuckled.

"Let me guess: Master Bruce craves apple pie this week?"

Alfred chuckled as well. "You're right, as usual, Johnny. He sends his regards, by the way, and thanks to Mrs. Truong for the _cheø_."

Johnny bowed slightly. "She will be glad to hear that he enjoyed it." Returning to the matter at hand, Johnny began to extol the virtues of his apples when a peculiar noise caught his and Alfred's attentions. It was a dull roar that quickly resolved itself into cheering. A distinct rushing sound accompanied it. Instinctively the two men turned, their eyes searching for what their ears had detected.

A figure in blue and red flashed down the street a hundred or so feet off the ground. Almost as soon as it had appeared, the figure was gone. The cheers and clapping lingered behind, though, and to Alfred, a delightful day had gotten even better.

**Western New Mexico**

The only real drawback of the experiment, Dementor concluded, was the forced relocation that resulted from it. He assumed as a matter of course that the authorities were always searching for him, so he had a number of lairs, and was always ready to leave one for another on a few hours notice.

That didn't mean, of course, that packing everything up, loading the trucks, and driving hundreds or thousands of miles to their new home was fun. It wasn't, and all the less so since they'd been in Phoenix only a few months. However, the blackout, especially because of its extensive nature, ensured that people wouldn't rest until they'd found out what caused it, and Dementor was sure they would have no trouble tracing it back to his old headquarters.

So he, his henchmen, lackeys and other employees were heading east, toward Texas.

The convoy was doing its best to be unobtrusive. Comprised of a dozen eighteen-wheelers and four charter-type buses, each vehicle was proceeding more-or-less independently for their new home.

Dementor's bus was the nicest of the four, reserved for himself and a handful of his closest associates. One of those was the man seated across the table from Dementor in the bus's small kitchen. John Stanford was a crystal engineer, an expert at analyzing and manipulating their growth patterns and properties. Dementor had run across the man during his recent brief stay in a Pennsylvania prison, and in him found a kindred spirit of sorts. Stanford was totally dedicated to his work, and never let anything like ethics or morals stand in his way. That was how he'd ended up behind bars: Stanford had been so determined not to let a rival upstage him that he'd actually broken into the other's lab and trashed the place, shooting and wounding two security guards who'd tried to stop him.

"The experiment was a success, Heinrich," Stanford was saying, "But only a qualified one."

Dementor had an idea about where Stanford was heading with this, but wanted to see if his notion was correct. "Qualified?" he challenged.

"Qualified," Stanford repeated. "I mean, sure the crystal grew, but it grew out of control. The reaction ran wild until it ran out of water. The crystals may be able to do all those things you say they can, but until we find out how to control their growth and select what we want them to form..." Stanford let his words trail off meaningfully.

"You're right of course, John," Dementor replied. "I was a bit surprised by how large a structure our little chip of crystal managed to make." Dementor gave Stanford a frank look. "Did you learn anything from the test?"

Stanford nodded. "I'm still going over the raw data," he explained, "And it'll be a day or two before I have even preliminary findings." Stanford swung he open laptop computer around so Dementor could see the screen. It showed one of Stanford's data charts, the ones Dementor still had trouble reading. Stanford, though, was already indicating points of interest and explaining what he thought they meant. And Dementor had no trouble understanding Stanford's words, or the ideas behind them.


	4. Chapter 4

**Middleton**

Kim was waiting in the kitchen when Kal-el came down for breakfast. In the few days he had lived with the Possible clan, she had invariably lingered in her upstairs bedroom while she and her husband Ron 'caught up' as they called it, usually not getting downstairs until well after everyone else had finished breakfast.

Today, she and Ron had beaten, if not everyone, Kal-el at least. Ron was seated at the kitchen table, sipping coffee along with Kim's father, who was reading the morning newspaper. Kim's mother was busily making breakfast, and Kal-el's nose picked up the scent of eggs, sausage and hash browns, which were quickly becoming his new breakfast favorites.

A look from Kim caught Kal-el's eye. She was dressed in shorts and a tank top, with running shoes on her feet.

"Kal-el," she said (speaking English, which Kal-el was picking up with astonishing speed, even without the help of Jor-el's teaching machines), "You and I are going to go running before breakfast."

"Running?" Kal-el repeated. "Why?"

"There are some things I have to tell you about life on Earth, and it will be easier, I think, if I can show you as well as tell you," she explained. "Ron's already gotten you suitable clothing, so go upstairs and get dressed, would you?"

Kim's tone suggested arguing would be futile, so with a last sorrowful glance at the food Patricia Possible was cooking, Kal-el turned and trudged up the stairs toward his room.

Ron watched him go with a grin on his face. "He reminds me of me when I was his age," he confided to Kim.

Kim smiled back. "And you haven't changed a whit in all the years since, at least not where your appetite is concerned," she teased gently. Then her expression firmed, and Ron tensed in apprehension. "You'd better go help him," Kim commanded.

"But K.P.," Ron protested, "Kal already knows how to get dressed, he..."

Kim cut him off with another look. "Does he know how a jock strap works?" she asked.

Ron's face fell. "Ah, no, probably not," he admitted. He looked over at the stove and sighed mournfully, then pushed back his chair and followed Kal-el upstairs.

* * *

It was a fine, clear morning: the air was crisp; the sky was a flawless, cloudless blue; and visible to the west were the peaks of the Rocky Mountains. The only blemish, Kim noted sourly, was the small knot of reporters gathered at the main gate of the Possible Compound. On the bright side, the gathering of TV and newspaper reporters had shrunk considerably over the last few days, and those that remained were mostly local.

"Probably hoping to catch a glimpse of Kal," Kim mused quietly. "I think we'll use the back gate," she added, grinning. She had a serious advantage over the reporters, for while she could see and hear them (x-ray vision and super-hearing being handy things to have, once in a while), they couldn't see her. That was due in part to the height and arrangement of the compound's walls, especially at the gates, which were dog-legged. Another reason was that there were few places in the immediate neighborhood that offered a view over the walls. Of the ones that did, the single one that wasn't owned by the Team Possible Foundation had its view blocked by a holographic 'shroud' that was visible only from that location.

Pushing the reporters from her mind, Kim led Kal-el around Mole Rat Hill, exchanging waves and greetings with such of the Hill's residents that were out and about. Kim knew that Middleton's mole rats had taken up agriculture, with "fields" both above and below ground. Her discerning eye, however, noted that their above ground 'fields' were more extensive than they had been before she left. X-ray vision probing deeper, Kim saw that the situation was the same below ground, with watchful field-hands keeping an eye on "herds" of insects. Outside, where birds of prey posed a real threat to the inhabitants of the Hill, weapons emplacements manned by watchful sentries stood ready to engage any intruder.

Kal-el took in the sight with wide, disbelieving eyes. "They're _intelligent_," he exclaimed at last.

"Very much so," Kim confirmed.

"But they're so small," Kal-el argued. "How did they manage it?"

"They didn't," Kim answered grimly. "They were genetically modified, illegally and against their will. But what's done is done. Ron and I keep an eye on them for the government, but to be honest, they don't need much in the way of minding."

Then Mole Rat Hill was behind them, and Kim was leading Kal-el out the back gate of the Possible Compound. The gate wasn't an actual gate, but a tunnel that ran from a storage shed down to a wooded ravine behind the compound. The ravine led down to blacktopped road. Strictly speaking, it was a city street, but it led out of Middleton into the farmland east of town and had a jogging path running alongside it.

* * *

While they stretched, Kim began her talk. "I'm sure you've noticed, Kal-el, that Earth's gravity is only about seventy-five percent as strong as Krypton's was."

The boy nodded. "I've noticed," he confirmed. "It's a little odd, but I'm getting used to it."

"Good," Kim said. "But the gravity is really the smallest part of the problem. What really matters," she went on, pointing at the sky, "is that, Earth's yellow sun."

Kal-el noted Kim's reference to Sol's color and seized on it. "What possible difference could your home sun's color have on anything, apart from making stuff look funny?"

"I don't know why it does what it does," Kim admitted. "My adoptive mother can't even begin to guess. My biological mother didn't understand it either, and she was one of Krypton's greatest biochemists."

At last, satisfied she was sufficiently limbered up, Kim jerked her head in the direction of the jogging path and said, "Let's go."

She led them off at a nice, steady pace, not pushing things at all. They jogged like that for a while, as traffic whizzed past in both directions.

After a flashy sports car zipped by them, Kim turned to Kal-el and asked, "Think we could catch that guy?"

Kal-el looked at her like she was nuts. "This is obviously a primary road," he gasped, gesturing at the pavement. Those ground cars can probably go scores, if not hundreds of radd'as an hour. There's no way people on foot could catch one."

"Let's try anyway," Kim challenged, and picked up the pace.

To his amazement, Kal-el found that, while his breathing was labored, to push himself harder and run faster didn't seem to take any more effort than he was already exerting. Eventually they were going so fast that passing ground cars only overtook them slowly, the occupants gaping at them in amazement until they recognized Kim.

Kim nodded to their front. "When we hit that little rise, jump as high as you can," she commanded.

The rise in question, a barely noticeable bump in the trail, approached rapidly.

"Now!" Kim cried.

Boom.

Kal-el yelped in fright as his feet left the ground and he found himself sailing higher and farther than he had ever jumped before. When he came down he stumbled and would have fallen, if not for Kim's steadying grip and her urging that he hit the ground running. They kept on, faster than before, passing startled joggers and bicyclists.

"Again!" Kim commanded.

Boom!

They flew even farther, three hundred 'as at least. Kal-el was ready this time, and noted numbly that his legs took the shock of landing with no difficulty.

"This time give it everything you've got, Kal-el. Now!"

BOOM!

They were airborne so long this time that Kal-el had time to look over at Kim, who smiled back at him and said, in a conversational tome of voice, as if she did this sort of thing every day and didn't find it the least bit unusual, "We'll stop at the end of this one."

They hit the ground and just stood there, Kal-el swaying drunkenly as he attempted to process what had just happened. Looking behind him, he saw that they were several radd'as away from Kim's home.

"And in just a few minutes, too," he noted, his voice oddly muted.

"Super speed and super strength will do that for you," Kim confirmed. "And you'll find, Kal-el, that those aren't the only powers Earth's yellow sun gives us. Kryptonians, I mean. Not," she cautioned, "that you'll have to use those powers like I do. I do what I do because I enjoy helping people who are in trouble. But maybe you'll want to be a rock star, or an artist, or a scientist, or whatever. Thing is, you're going to have the powers whether you want them or not, and you'll have to learn to control them, at the very least, so you don't accidentally hurt someone."

"What kind of 'other powers'?" Kal-el asked reluctantly. Kim told him.

* * *

Kal-el's mind whirled as he tried to process what Kim had said. Flight? Invulnerability? X-ray vision? Super hearing? It seemed absurd, fantastical even. But Kim had no reason to lie to him, and his own recent experience was proof that at least part of what she told him was true. Certainly his own eyesight and hearing seemed unusually acute. As he and Kim walked back toward her home (at a normal pace, thank Rao, that gave him time to think) he kept looking up at Sol, then at the world around him, and at Kim. There wasn't a single logical, scientific reason for Sol to give Kim, or anyone else for that matter, great powers. He was only fourteen, but living on Argo had left him better schooled in the physical sciences than Kryptonians many years his senior. Kal-el felt a faint grin cross his lips. Not too surprising, really, considering that his mother had been an astrophysicist and his father a mechanical engineer. They had never pushed their own careers on him; it hadn't been necessary. Kal-el had been fascinated with physics for years, and Argo had been like a magnet school.

Kal-el considered and rejected the notion that Kim was some kind of solar battery. Her surface area was far too small, even if she was one hundred percent efficient (impossible of course; nothing was one hundred percent efficient), to absorb enough stellar energy to so much as stand up. One glance at the fields to either side of them was proof of that. Food plants took an entire season to store enough energy to provide a single meal, and they did nothing but stand in place and grow.

No other remotely feasible possibility occurred to him, no matter how much he wracked his brain. Unless...

For many Kryptonians the concept of Rao was embodied in the red giant their homeworld circled. Was Sol a god too? Had He chosen Kim to be an instrument of His power...? Kal-el shook his head, dismissing the crazy theological notion. Stars weren't gods. However Kim got her powers, there was, somewhere, a perfectly rational scientific explanation.

* * *

Ron was meditating, sitting cross-legged on the ground, when Kim and Kal-el returned through the back gate of the Team Possible compound. Rufus and Dexter were seated on Ron's knees in identical poses, meditating along with him. As Kim and Kal-el approached Ron opened his eyes and smiled at Kim.

"How'd the talk go?" he asked.

"Pretty well," Kim allowed, "Though he's a bit skeptical about some of it."

"Which parts?" Ron inquired.

Kal-el answered. "The whole 'invulnerable' thing. I mean: 'Utterly impervious to physical harm'? I just can't see it."

Ron stood up, Rufus and Dexter scrambling up his legs and into the pockets of Ron's shirt.

"Easily remedied," Ron assured the boy. Turning toward Mole Rat Hill he called out, "Sentry Longinus!" The nearest mole rat lookout turned, snapping to attention as he did so. To Kal-el Ron said: "Pick a target."

Kal-el fumbled for a moment, then indicated a large rock that was part of the back yard's landscaping.

"Longinus: demonstration strike. Target: rock," Ron ordered, pointing at the rock.

Longinus nodded and worked the controls of his weapon, a turret sporting twin barrels that swung to point at the rock. Longinus fired four times, sending eight bolts of blue energy at the rock. Where they struck, small explosions cratered the surface, sending stone chips flying.

Kal-el just stared, unsure of the point of what had just happened.

Then Ron said, "Longinus: demonstration strike. Target: Kim."

Without a moments hesitation the naked mole rat turned his weapon to bear on its new target and fired again. Kim didn't so much as flinch as eight more shots struck her square in the chest, shredding her top and bra and setting the remnants on fire.

Kim pulled off the tattered, smoldering remains, crossed her arms over her unblemished bosom and met Kal-el's shocked gaze.

"Invulnerable," she said, and headed for the house.


End file.
